Patreon is an incredible platform for musicians seeking to monetize the direct fan-artist relationship with regular content updates.

Patreon’s motto of “empowering a new generation of content creators” is actually quite apt. Perhaps than any other crowdfunding platform, they get that the future is in monetizing the fan-artist relationship.

The model behind Patreon is totally unique among crowdfunding platforms. For example, let’s say you’re a musician (because you probably are). You put up your Patreon profile with a pitch for creating a simple music video once every other month. Every time you post a video, you get a tip from each fan subscribing to your Patreon account. The subscriber sets their own tip amount, as well as a maximum budget to ensure they don’t go over if a musician releases 10 videos of artistic silence or whatever.

Similar to “traditional” crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter, you can offer rewards to entice greater tip amounts.

Patreon will take approximately 9% (giving about 4% up for payment processing), which is on the more reasonable side of commissions for musician platforms.